


nothing else to do

by mildlydiscouraging



Category: The Bright Sessions (Podcast)
Genre: Gen, Light Angst, Missing Scene, Season/Series 04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-16
Updated: 2018-03-16
Packaged: 2019-03-30 18:29:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13957452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mildlydiscouraging/pseuds/mildlydiscouraging
Summary: Chloe Turner is a people person. She relies on other people, loves all the different ways of getting to know someone and making them happy. All her energy and inspiration comes from the people surrounding her, and it always has, which is what makes this so hard.





	nothing else to do

Chloe Turner is a people person. She always has been. There's never been a time where she could even imagine not being surrounded by people, surrounded by different voices and stories to listen to. There's something about the dynamics of a group and feeling the push and pull of different personalities and senses of humor all in one conversation that Chloe finds exhilarating. All the different threads that connect people—love and history and shared interests—working together in tandem... There's nothing like it.

That's why the first few months after her ability started to kick in were particularly cruel. Having to sequester herself from everyone, even her mom, who had always been there for her to rely on, had taken a toll on Chloe, and that's not even mentioning the fact that everyone thought she was losing her mind. It was agony being alone with herself and only herself, unable to turn to another person without feeling her skull crack under the pressure, the pain swelling like a balloon inside, and although the eventual relief wasn't total, it was still sweet.

It feels like that again, now, when she has to go away. The constant migraine drowns out anything but the thought of being alone for one minute. It's like Chloe forgets how important other people are to her very being when talking to them is like standing barefoot on a pile of broken glass, but important still they are, and that hurts almost as much. Having to avoid the very thing that sustains her out of self-preservation hurts—and worst of all, it hurts not only her but the people she loves too.

Everyone is always pointing out how much she loves love, and it's true, but it's not just that. She loves the way people relate to each other. Being part of a group, getting to do things on her own but still knowing there's this whole interconnected web of relationships around her that she can fall back on, has always been the most important thing to Chloe. Hearing people's thoughts just emphasizes it. It's not just a figurative thing anymore but a literal one as she's able to feel the bonds people form, noticing affection just in the way someone's thoughts form around another person. It's absolutely amazing.

She can still feel that, slightly, from time to time. Even taking time for herself (a well-deserved break) Chloe ends up talking to her mom and Caleb and Sam on the phone whenever she can. It's a little bit like normal, but a poor substitute; when she's talking to Caleb on the phone she recognizes the inflection in his voice that usually would accompany warm thoughts about Adam, and it's almost just as good except for that it makes her ache for the actual connection. It's not that Chloe was entirely dependent on her ability—she's heard now what that can do and... yikes—but it's like her hands just stopped working one day, locked up in one position, cramping every other minute, unable to do any of the things she relies on them for. It's so hard to go back.

And now she has to miss everything else too. It's not just hearing thoughts and feeling impressions of someone else's life that are missing, but even the little things that her ability didn't touch. Chloe misses cooking with her mom and talking about their days, making Frank help her fold laundry even though they're both objectively the worst at it, wine night with Sam and hanging out with Caleb and Adam and even Joan, she misses _Joan_ , and awkward mutual avoidance with Mark—that's the worst of it, missing the things that aren't even good. She misses the existence of other people, whether being around them is a positive or negative thing, whether she can read their minds or not. She misses _people_.

"When you think about it," Sam says one day when Chloe mentions it, "it's kind of miraculous that we're even friends."

She's been ducking in and out of frame the whole conversation as she rearranges the last batch of unpacked books, but now she's settled in front of her laptop, cross-legged on the floor. When she tilts her head and raises an eyebrow, even without her power Chloe knows what she's thinking. "You thrive off human contact and I'm pretty much the epitome of introversion."

"I can't help it, I'm a people person!" Chloe tries to make her voice cheerful, but there's a bitterness in her smile as she glances past the laptop into the empty house. A people person indeed.

Sam picks up on this, and Chloe reminds herself to point out that she isn't as hopeless when it comes to social interaction as she thinks as Sam asks, "How are you holding up up there?"

"Great," Chloe says, hoping Sam chalks up her brief delay to the instability of upstate wifi. The way Sam narrows her eyes slightly says no, but Chloe continues before she can start her interrogation. "All the open space up here is really inspiring. I know I showed you the garden already but every day it's something new. Mr. Sandoval has been showing me how to take care of the different plants. Oh! And I showed him some of the files you sent over. He's definitely still keeping something from me, I'm getting a clearer picture every day, but at least what he says seems to be true."

"That's great," Sam says, and she looks genuinely pleased, in her own quiet, kind of sad way. Chloe knows if she were there that there'd be a little bit of guilt painting it, like she wasn't already doing the most that she could, and Chloe is about to say so when Sam continues, "You sure you're okay?"

"Yeah, Sam," Chloe says. "I'm doing good." No doubt she's doing her _please don't worry about me while I'm busy worrying about you_ face, the one Caleb says makes him feel about five years old, but she can't help it. She just hopes it looks sincere.

Because it is.

Mostly.

After a second of consideration, Sam nods and moves on, talking about the other day when everyone came over and they finally had that game night they've been meaning to. When Sam gets to the part where Caleb and Mark were bringing back more popcorn and accidentally tipped it all over Rose's head, her face lights up. Chloe half smiles and Sam's expression turns apologetic for a moment, guilty and off-balance. Chloe wants to shake her head again, pull Sam out of the insecurity, but yeah, there's a selfish little part of her that wants Sam to regret bringing it up.

If she's being completely honest (and when it's just her and there's no reason not to be, it's a lot harder to lie to herself) she feels a little like she's been replaced. Especially with the addition of Rose to their group—and Rose sounds lovely, really, and Chloe is sure they would get along great—Chloe feels herself... drifting. She's untethered, and the world keeps moving on without her, filling in the gaps. Everyone exists unobserved, and of course, they always do, but sometimes maybe it starts to feel like Chloe doesn't.

She loves her friends too much to really care, though. She's happy that they're happy. She just wishes she could be there with them.

So yes. Chloe loves love. She loves being able to know that the people around her truly care about her, that there's still some good in the world in the way people treat each other. It hurts to not be able to know it with the same certainty as she used to, but even alone she's still never lonely.

It's just a little hard to remember that when there's no one there to tell her.

**Author's Note:**

> i just miss chloe so much................ i really thought for a solid second when sam picked up the phone in the new episode that it was gonna be her and i was that much more mad when it was... who it turned out to be
> 
> anyway catch me accidentally writing a fic about game night bc i made it up for a one line joke but now i'm like Okay But They Try To Play Scrabble And It Quickly Devolves Into An Adam And Joan Face Off They've Been Playing For Hours We Just Want To Go Home
> 
> title from "[franklin avenue](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlKWEJ8y_G8)" by jeremy messersmith, number one bop man and also who i listen to when i'm homesick and lonely and miss my friends
> 
> tumblr @[moonfullofstars](http://moonfullofstars.tumblr.com)  
> ko-fi @[mildlydiscouraging](https://ko-fi.com/mildlydiscouraging)


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